Global Healthhttp://kplu.org
enEbola 'Still Small Potatoes,' But A Major Menace In West Africahttp://kplu.org/post/ebola-still-small-potatoes-major-menace-west-africa
<p><iframe frameborder="no" height="166" scrolling="no" src="https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/173511306&amp;color=ff5500&amp;auto_play=false&amp;hide_related=false&amp;show_comments=true&amp;show_user=true&amp;show_reposts=false" width="100%"></iframe></p><p>As the Ebola outbreak first emerged in West Africa, some global health experts downplayed it. The virus has flared up here and there since it was discovered in the 1970s, and rarely has its death toll exceeded a few dozen or at most a few hundred.</p><p>“I actually was among those who didn’t think it would be that big a deal, and like the previous ones, it would be contained and would burn itself out very quickly,” said Tom Paulson, who has been covering global health for nearly 20 years. “I was dead wrong.”</p><p>Paulson, the founder and editor of <a href="http://www.humanosphere.org/" target="_blank">Humanosphere</a>, sat down with KPLU to talk about <a href="http://www.humanosphere.org/podcasts/2014/10/chat-laurie-garrett-ebola/" target="_blank">why he’s changed his mind</a>&nbsp;and come to see Ebola in Africa as a major menace.</p><p>Thu, 23 Oct 2014 12:01:00 +0000Gabriel Spitzer19214 at http://kplu.orgEbola 'Still Small Potatoes,' But A Major Menace In West AfricaSeattle's Harborview Agrees To Accept Evacuated U.S. Ebola Patientshttp://kplu.org/post/seattles-harborview-agrees-accept-evacuated-us-ebola-patients
<p><iframe frameborder="no" height="166" scrolling="no" src="https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/170948286&amp;color=ff5500&amp;auto_play=false&amp;hide_related=false&amp;show_comments=true&amp;show_user=true&amp;show_reposts=false" width="100%"></iframe></p><p>Harborview Medical Center in Seattle has agreed to consider accepting Americans infected with Ebola who have been evacuated from Africa. It’s just the fifth hospital in the United States to do so.</p><p>UW Medicine, which operates Harborview, said the decision would be based on whether the hospital has capacity at the time. Dr. Timothy Dellit said the hospital’s normal infection controls and a heightened awareness of patients’ travel history will help minimize any risk to health workers or the public.</p><p>Mon, 06 Oct 2014 19:54:28 +0000Gabriel Spitzer18877 at http://kplu.orgSeattle's Harborview Agrees To Accept Evacuated U.S. Ebola PatientsEmerging History Of HIV Pandemic Sheds Light On How Infectious Diseases Spreadhttp://kplu.org/post/emerging-history-hiv-pandemic-sheds-light-how-infectious-diseases-spread
<iframe width="100%" height="166" scrolling="no" frameborder="no" src="https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/170390352&amp;color=ff5500&amp;auto_play=false&amp;hide_related=false&amp;show_comments=true&amp;show_user=true&amp;show_reposts=false"></iframe><p>A Seattle scientist is helping piece together the history of the HIV pandemic, and the new findings on when and where the pandemic began are helping explain how infectious diseases go global.</p><p>Thu, 02 Oct 2014 22:32:58 +0000Gabriel Spitzer18839 at http://kplu.orgEmerging History Of HIV Pandemic Sheds Light On How Infectious Diseases SpreadUW Researchers Forecast More Crowded Planet, Warn Population Could Hit 11 Billionhttp://kplu.org/post/uw-researchers-forecast-more-crowded-planet-warn-population-could-hit-11-billion
<p>The planet could be much more crowded by the end of the century than previously thought, according to a <a href="http://www.sciencemag.org/content/early/2014/09/17/science.1257469" target="_blank">new report by University of Washington researchers</a>.</p><p>That contradicts a general consensus that world population growth is likely to stabilize before long. The population has been expected to rise from the current seven billion or so to about nine billion, before leveling off and possibly declining.</p><p>But new projections, based on new statistical models, suggest the numbers will not tail off after all. Instead, statistician and sociologist Adrian Raftery said we could hit 11 billion and counting by century’s end.</p><p>Thu, 18 Sep 2014 21:49:45 +0000Gabriel Spitzer18667 at http://kplu.orgUW Researchers Forecast More Crowded Planet, Warn Population Could Hit 11 BillionGates Foundation To Spend $50 Million On Ebola Response http://kplu.org/post/gates-foundation-spend-50-million-ebola-response
<p style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: Verdana, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif, Geneva; font-size: 15.4545450210571px; line-height: 15px;"><span style="font-size: 15.4545450210571px;">The Bill &amp; Melinda Gates Foundation says it will spend $50 million to support emergency response to the Ebola outbreak in West Africa, in addition to the $10 million the foundation has already committed.</span></p><div style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: Verdana, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif, Geneva; font-size: 15.4545450210571px; line-height: 15px;"><p>In an announcement Wednesday, the Seattle-based foundation said the money will go to the United Nations and international organizations involved in fighting transmission of the virus.</p>Wed, 10 Sep 2014 18:02:07 +0000The Associated Press18529 at http://kplu.orgGates Foundation To Spend $50 Million On Ebola Response Puget Sound VA Says It's Making Progress In Reducing Its Waitlist For Primary Carehttp://kplu.org/post/puget-sound-va-says-its-making-progress-reducing-its-waitlist-primary-care
<p><iframe frameborder="no" height="166" scrolling="no" src="https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/163328404&amp;color=ff5500&amp;auto_play=false&amp;hide_related=false&amp;show_comments=true&amp;show_user=true&amp;show_reposts=false" width="100%"></iframe></p><p>The head of the VA Puget Sound Health Care System, Michael Murphy, says the agency is making progress in getting veterans in to see a primary care doctor, but he says there’s still a lot more work to do to improve care for veterans in this region.&nbsp;</p>Fri, 15 Aug 2014 22:39:37 +0000Ashley Gross18183 at http://kplu.org5 Reasons Eating Bugs Could Save The World, According To Seattle's Own 'Bug Chef'http://kplu.org/post/5-reasons-eating-bugs-could-save-world-according-seattles-own-bug-chef
<p><iframe frameborder="no" height="166" scrolling="no" src="https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/159719343&amp;color=ff5500&amp;auto_play=false&amp;hide_related=false&amp;show_comments=true&amp;show_user=true&amp;show_reposts=false" width="100%"></iframe></p><p>Seattle author David George Gordon would be more than happy to <a href="http://davidgeorgegordon.com/?page_id=5158">share his recipe </a>for his three bee salad or cricket nymph risotto. Try the deep-fried tarantula, the bloomin’ onion of arachnids.</p><p>Gordon is known as “the bug chef,” and has written one of the more comprehensive <a href="http://davidgeorgegordon.com/?page_id=5125">cookbooks showcasing bugs and their kin</a>. He is also a true believer in insects as a food source for an ever-hungrier planet, as laid out in a <a href="http://www.fao.org/docrep/018/i3253e/i3253e.pdf">lengthy U.N. report last year</a>.</p><p>Tue, 22 Jul 2014 12:00:00 +0000Gabriel Spitzer17834 at http://kplu.org5 Reasons Eating Bugs Could Save The World, According To Seattle's Own 'Bug Chef'Public Health Crusader And College Student Talk Sex, AIDS And What Makes Them Madhttp://kplu.org/post/public-health-crusader-and-college-student-talk-sex-aids-and-what-makes-them-mad
<p><iframe frameborder="no" height="166" scrolling="no" src="https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/154995614&amp;color=ff5500&amp;auto_play=false&amp;hide_related=false&amp;show_artwork=true&amp;show_comments=true&amp;show_user=true&amp;show_reposts=false" width="100%"></iframe></p><p><em style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-size: 15.454545021057129px; vertical-align: baseline; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: Georgia, Times, serif; line-height: 22px;">Editor's Note:&nbsp;<a href="http://www.kplu.org/term/senior-thesis" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; color: rgb(12, 76, 162);">“Senior Thesis”</a>&nbsp;is a special week-long series that brings together venerable veterans in various fields with university students hoping to forge a career in the same field.</em></p><p>Bob Wood and Carolyn Wortham sat opposite each other in the KPLU studio, separated by a generation during which a whole lot had happened.</p><p>Between the time that Dr. Wood took up arms against the AIDS epidemic and when Wortham took on the same fight, the illness has gone from mysterious killer to manageable condition. The battlefield had moved, to some extent, from urban gay neighborhoods to the developing world.</p><p>Thu, 19 Jun 2014 12:00:00 +0000Gabriel Spitzer17244 at http://kplu.orgPublic Health Crusader And College Student Talk Sex, AIDS And What Makes Them MadSaving newborn lives with a cardboard boxhttp://kplu.org/post/saving-newborn-lives-cardboard-box
<p style="margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; color: rgb(51, 51, 51);"><span style="line-height: 1.5;">It’s a safe bet. &nbsp;Sending cardboard boxes to poor countries will be&nbsp;the next big global child health initiative.</span></p>Wed, 05 Jun 2013 21:46:11 +0000Tom Paulson8998 at http://kplu.orgSaving newborn lives with a cardboard boxWhy Bill Gates Thinks Ending Polio Is Worth Ithttp://kplu.org/post/why-bill-gates-thinks-ending-polio-worth-it
Some critics say that ending polio has become Bill Gates' "white whale."<p>Why not just settle for the huge drop in polio cases that we've seen over the past decade and then spend money on other things that kill so many more kids, like diarrhea and malnutrition?<p>"Polio is special," Gates tells NPR's Robert Siegel on <em>All Things Considered</em>. "Once you get it done, you save $2 billion a year that will be applied to those other activities.Wed, 08 May 2013 20:06:17 +00008709 at http://kplu.orgWhy Bill Gates Thinks Ending Polio Is Worth ItSeattle doc makes doc film to draw attention to mental illness http://kplu.org/post/seattle-doc-makes-doc-film-draw-attention-mental-illness
<p>Delaney Ruston&nbsp;spent a lot of her early days as a physician working in clinics for the poor and disenfranchised, like Berkeley Free Clinic and, later, Seattle’s&nbsp;Pike Market Medial Clinic&nbsp;with a few of area’s leading and long-time health activists Les Pittle and Joe Martin.</p><p>“Early on, I kept wondering why we, the medical community, usually just communicated by giving talks and writing reports, said Delaney. Why, she wondered, did the medical community not make better use of video, especially as a form of physician-doctor communication, since it is so emotionally compelling, personal and we’re such visual animals?</p><p>Fri, 03 May 2013 22:11:02 +0000Tom Paulson8663 at http://kplu.orgSeattle-based PATH to help produce anti-malarial drug at costhttp://kplu.org/post/seattle-based-path-help-produce-anti-malarial-drug-cost
<p><span style="line-height: 1.5;">Malaria remains one of the&nbsp;world’s biggest killers&nbsp;and also a massive economic drag on poor countries, poor families.</span></p><p>One of our best weapons against this scourge is a drug known as&nbsp;artemisinin, which is harvested from the plant sweet wormwood and, as a crop, is about as predictable as corn or hog futures.</p><p>Thu, 11 Apr 2013 15:58:48 +0000Tom Paulson8380 at http://kplu.orgSeattle-based PATH to help produce anti-malarial drug at costGates Foundation wants to make safe sex more fun http://kplu.org/post/gates-foundation-wants-make-safe-sex-more-fun
<p><span style="line-height: 1.5;">The Bill &amp; Melinda Gates Foundation thinks safe sex isn’t as much fun as it should be.</span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">At least, that seems to be the gist of one request for a grant application from the world’s largest philanthropy as part of its&nbsp;<a href="http://www.grandchallenges.org/Explorations/Pages/Introduction.aspx" style="color: rgb(51, 102, 204); text-decoration: underline; font-weight: bold;" target="_blank">Grand Challenges Explorations</a>&nbsp;program. One of the goals for this round is to&nbsp;<a href="http://www.grandchallenges.org/Explorations/Topics/Pages/NextGenerationCondomRound11.aspx" style="color: rgb(51, 102, 204); font-weight: bold;" target="_blank">develop a better condom</a>.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">“It is a bit unusual,” said Stephen Ward, the program officer with the Gates Foundation administering the project.</p><p style="margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Tue, 12 Mar 2013 21:10:27 +0000Tom Paulson7958 at http://kplu.orgGates Foundation wants to make safe sex more fun Big data gets another blessing from Bill Gateshttp://kplu.org/post/big-data-gets-another-blessing-bill-gates
<p></p><p><span style="line-height: 1.5;">Sometimes seeing data presented in the right way can change your entire view of the world.&nbsp;</span></p><p>Bill Gates says that’s what happened to him 20 years ago, with global health:</p><blockquote><p>“I was completely stunned by the burden of disease in poor countries, to see that diarrhea was killing literally millions of children, and that some of those causes of diarrhea, like rotavirus, were preventable," he said. "There was a vaccine available in rich countries, but ironically, not in poor countries."</p>Tue, 05 Mar 2013 20:54:17 +0000Keith Seinfeld7903 at http://kplu.orgBig data gets another blessing from Bill GatesAfter consulate bombing, Libyan doctors getting help in Seattlehttp://kplu.org/post/after-consulate-bombing-libyan-doctors-getting-help-seattle
<p></p><p>The rocket attack in Libya that killed U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens gets plenty of attention in Congress. But, not many have heard about a global health project Stevens left behind.</p><p>When Stevens was murdered last Sept. 11th in Benghazi, Libya, he had a meeting scheduled with a group of doctors the very next day, Sept. 12th. They're trying to setup Libya’s first modern 911 system.</p><p>Now, Stevens' sister, in Seattle, is bringing a higher profile to that unfinished project – helping a group from Boston that’s working with the Libyan doctors.Fri, 15 Feb 2013 01:54:06 +0000Keith Seinfeld7802 at http://kplu.orgAfter consulate bombing, Libyan doctors getting help in Seattle